Eventually Law ended up with D.C. Comics and they have done an excellent collected edition of our work. At one stage, both Kevin and I would have been nervous of them buying Law in case they ‘bought it to bury it’, but there were radical changes at D.C. with Jim Lee at the helm. In fact, while Kevin was at a San Diego convention, they suggested a Marshal Law/Batman crossover to him. Yes, I know it sounds unlikely that a conservative comic corporation should even consider such a team-up, but they seemed quite serious at the time and Kevin and myself readily agreed.
I was already familiar with Batman , having written Batman: The Book of Shadows with Debbie Gallagher, illustrated by Duke Mighten. I’d found an angle on the character that I could live with. Warped occultists were preying on lonely kids and Batman, ‘King of the Lonely’, goes to their rescue.
But the prospect of the Marshal Law fox getting in with those superhero chickens was just too good an opportunity to miss. Contracts were duly signed and my preliminary synopsis was approved. Looking back, I have no negative feelings about it. It was worth a try, I think everyone at D.C. also tried, and they were all friendly and helpful, if restricted by the requirements of big corporation. Some things are simply not meant to be.
BATMAN / LAW CROSSOVER.
Pat Mills & Kevin O’Neill
Our story involves a super hero, the sinister-looking TRANSPORTER who is a patient at the Mission Hospital San Futuro where medical orderly Joe Gilmore (who is also Marshal Law ) is looking after him. THE TRANSPORTER is the product of a “Philadelphia Experiment” by Shocc (Super Hero operational Command and Control run by the Government in Law’s world). This tormented character is literally a Human Black Hole, travelling endlessly between alternative Earths, including Batman’s Gotham, before returning to the Mission Hospital.
He wants to “get off the dimensional carousel” and has discovered that the solution is in an alternative Gotham (not the regular Batman Gotham). But his torment and savage acts of vengeance have brought him in conflict with Batman from this alternative Gotham.
The story begins as the “insane” Transporter scrawls Batman imagery on the walls of his high-security cell. Like Renfield in Dracula. The Transporter announces to Joe “he is coming.” When Batman arrives, under dramatic circumstances, Marshal Law is unhappy at another super hero entering his domain. They will clash ; but later the two characters work together to deal with the Transporter threat.
le script
